Addressing Longevity, Life Expectancy and Health Life Expectancy (original) (raw)
Related papers
Journal of Population Ageing, 2011
Conventional indicators of human lifespan are based on a hypothetical synthesis of the mortality conditions of different cohorts with (as yet) incomplete life histories. There is a considerable ongoing debate about improvements to the traditional methodology under changing mortality rates . Improved measurement of the human lifespan is crucial for estimating prospects of longevity ) and for understanding the implications of population ageing ; Council of the European Union 2009). Here we show that both the centuries-long tradition of conventional lifespan indicators and the more recent criticism of them ignore the true exposures of individuals to prevailing mortality levels. These exposures form a genuine part of a more comprehensive picture of the prevailing mortality conditions. In lowmortality countries, our estimated duration of human life is about 95 years, which exceeds the conventional estimates by 15 years. This difference is crucial for health care, long-term care and pension systems. Our theory implies that mortality dynamics are characterised by considerable inertia. This is used to develop new effective methods of forecasting, leading to a more optimistic outlook for future mortality. Even if there were no further change in mortality conditions, conventional life expectancy at birth will rise to 90 years by 2050, while the probability to survive beyond age 100 will reach 30% in low-mortality countries. Conventional longevity indicators still provide a useful summary of the observed mortality rates which, in turn, are essential for population projections. However, they do not give the full picture of current mortality conditions and mislead about the prospects of human longevity.
Increase in common longevity and the compression of mortality: The case of Japan
Population Studies, 2007
This study shows a strong increase in the modal age at death (M) in Japan over a period of 50 calendar years, accompanied by a clear decrease in the standard deviation of ages at death above M (SD(M'/)) until the 1990s for men and the mid-1980s for women. For the most recent periods SD(M'/) appears to have stopped decreasing, even though M has continued to increase linearly. This stagnation in SD(M'/) has been accompanied by stagnation in q(M). The number of deaths at M (d(M)) and the number of deaths at and above M (d(M'/)) have increased, but significantly more slowly since the period 1975 Á79. Since the 1980s an acceleration in the increase of M'/kSD(M'/), our indicator of the longest life durations, has been essentially due to the pause in SD(M'/). Our data do not suggest that we are approaching an upper limit in human longevity.
Emergence of Supercentenarians in Low-Mortality Countries
North American Actuarial Journal, 2002
The exponential increase in the number of centenarians, which started just after World War II, is well documented in Europe and Japan. Much less is known about the population of extremely old persons reaching age 105-the semisupercentenarians-or age 110-the supercentenarians. The first cases of validated supercentenarians appeared in the 1960s, and their numbers have steadily increased since the mid-1980s. The current prevalence of known supercentenarians in low-mortality countries involved in the International Database on Longevity (IDL) is approximately 10 times higher than in the mid-1970s. In roughly 20 years, from 1980 to 2000, the maximum reported age at death, which was once assumed to indicate the maximum life span of the human species and seen as a stable characteristic of our species, has increased by about 10 years from 112 to 122 years. The annual probability of death at age 110 is about 50% and stays at that level through age 114. Our results strongly support the finding that mortality does not increase according to the Gompertz curve at the highest ages, and the results are consistent with a plateau between ages 110 and 115. The data after age 115 are so sparse that they are not analyzed here, but an earlier study suggested that mortality may fall after age 115. We intend to investigate this question in subsequent research.
The relationship between increasing life expectancy and healthy life expectancy
2005
The continued increases in life expectancy with no obvious deceleration, the proliferation of centenarians and appearance of supercentarians (those aged 110 years and over) leave us in no doubt that the belief that life expectancy was limited to 85 years is now untenable. Although we may ask how long the limits to life can be pushed, the crucial question is whether the extra years gained year on year in life expectancy are healthy years. This paper begins by reviewing what was historically believed to be the theoretical relationships between life expectancy and healthy life expectancy. We debate how current knowledge of mortality rates in the old and oldest old, the trends in healthy life expectancy, and the gap between the genders shed light upon these theoretical models, discussing the fact that different models may exist in different cohorts of the same population. The paper closes with some speculations on how we might monitor the evolution of healthy life expectancy more closel...
The world trend in maximum life span
and Sweden. Although data are complete only for these seven, three additional countries contributed at least some cases of "3-star validated" super-centenarians used to construct 2B: Canada, France, and the United States. Using a less rigorous selection criterion, six more countries contributed cases of "validated" super-centenarians shown in 2A: Australia
Global Demographic Change - On Longevity
Mednarodno inovativno poslovanje = Journal of Innovative Business and Management, 2019
In this paper the author examines patterns and prospects for the leading causes of death in countries across the globe. An explicit focus is on the diversity and ongoing dynamics of mortality. New factors promising to contribute to a longer and healthier life help to draw a picture of our life in the decades to come and its opportunities for business and society. Based on this the author presents several scenarios for forecasting of life expectancy with different degrees of probability.
Common adult longevity and compression of mortality: the M Project
2009
Taking all the data available in the Human Mortality Database (HMD), this study illustrates the interest of a mode-oriented approach to longevity research, focusing on the most common longevity. Several indicators built from the adult modal age at death (M) are introduced to describe the adult longevity and its changes over time, examining whether an increase in the most frequent age at death is always accompanied by a compression of the mortality occurring above it. Comparative analysis with standard mortality measures (i.e. life expectancy at birth (e(0)), median, life expectancy at age 65 and the logarithm of the geometric mean of age-specific death rates between ages 65 and 99) is also presented. In this study, we show that M is useful not only as a measure of longevity but also in understanding and applying major mathematical models of mortality trajectory (i.e. the Gompertz, logistic, Weibull, Lexis models), using M as a parameter and investigating characteristics of M-related...
Living and dying beyond age 100 in Japan
2001
It is acknowledged today that the number of oldest old persons, nonagenarians and centenarians, is increasing rapidly. Analysis of data from Japan, where female life expectancy at birth approaches the assumed limit of 85 years, can provide priceless information on a possible acceleration of the demographic changes concerning the oldest old population. Adjusted for a constant size of the birth cohorts, the Centenarian Doubling Time (CDT i.e. the number of years needed to double the number of centenarians), has been halved in nearly 25 years. During this period, data show a strong increase in the maximum reported age at death. Death rates at 100 years and above clearly decrease if we exclude males at age 105 and over. In addition, previous studies of excess mortality in the Winter months suggest environment interventions that could further decrease the death rates. In 1980, James Fries published “Aging, natural death, and the compression of morbidity”, a paper which became a seminal w...